Animating an interactive conversational character for an educational game system

Abstract

Within the framework of the project NICE (Natural Interactive Communication for Edutainment) [2], we have been developing an educational and entertaining computer game that allows children and teenagers to interact with a conversational character impersonating the fairy tale writer H.C. Andersen (HCA). The rationale behind our system is to make kids learn about HCA's life, fairy tales and historical period while playing and having fun. We report on the character's generation and realization of both verbal and 3D graphical non-verbal output behaviors, such as speech, body gestures and facial expressions. This conveys the impression of a human-like agent with relevant domain knowledge, and distinct personality. With the educational goal in the foreground, coherent and synchronized output presentation becomes mandatory, as any inconsistency may undermine the user's learning process rather than reinforcing it.